annadrc

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-politics-protests-idUSKCN0YO0RYThis article says that French airline pilots are striking June 11-14--right when we are supposed to be on AirFrance to end up in Moscow for our cruise.

I'm trying not to freak out.

Are you going with a specific company on your vacation? We are going with Viking to Russia next week--I did our visas through GenVisa and their guide on how to fill it out is SPOT ON. http://genvisa.com/viking/pdfs/VikingRussia.pdf

It took exactly 6 weeks from when I submitted it to receiving it at home.

Getting my mom's visas were a nightmare. She almost didn't get to go on the cruise because between the Indian embassy and the "expediting" company she used, somebody screwed up big time. She got her documents the day before she left. it was terrible.

Anyway--I talked to Mom when she was in San Fran and said the internet was so horribly slow that she had given up trying to send any email. I bet that's partly why some who are on the ship haven't been back here to update at all.

I hope that everyone is having a great time as they head to Hawaii!!

I hope all of you getting on the ship today have an easy time of it. My mom is going to be visiting my brother while in San Fran--I'm looking forward to talking to her finally!!

Thank you for the continued updates--I really enjoy them!

Thank you everyone for your updates--my mom is on this cruise--she embarked in Florida and will sail until Southampton. I'm enjoying reading what's going on. I only hear from her every 4 or 5 days so far. I hope you all continue to enjoy your cruise!

Annadrc,

Thanks for the great review/report on your visit to Cozumel. We have a tour scheduled with Gerry next month, so I was very interested in reading about the places that you stopped.

Did you think that San Gervasio Mayan Ruins was worth seeing? How long was your tour? Any other suggestions/

If you have been to Mayan ruins before, I wouldn't necessarily feel the need to stop at San Gervasio. If you haven't, then I think it would be worth it. For us, we had never been before so wanted to take it in. We thought the admission was a little steep for what you get (there are two stations where you have to pay fees to get in, I don't recall what it totaled but think it was around $8/person).

We toured for a about 4 1/2 hours. It was longer than I anticipated, but the island was also a little bigger than I was expecting so I had underestimated the travel time to get from place to place. If you want to keep your time short and plan to do lots of shopping, I would recommend skipping the shopping with the driver and spending your time outside downtown, then being dropped off at the shops on the way back. You can then catch a cab for $7 back to the ships rather than paying $25/hr for your driver to wait for you.

The website Eduardo built has a nice listing of possible spots.

http://www.toursplaza.com/categorias/info/hiring_a_driver

If you email Eduardo the kinds of things you want to do (for example, snorkeling with your own equipment), I am sure he and Gerry can come up with some recommendations for an itinerary, including things not on the site.

Now that we have just completed our cruise, I wanted to share our experience in Cozumel. After being very frustrated with the reservation process in January through Mike, we learned in February that Gerry was now having a new person handle his reservations (Eduardo - see a previous post by me for contact information). It was like night and day - Eduardo was extremely responsive (often within minutes as he carries a Blackberry), helping me find another driver when we learned that Gerry was booked. We were placed with Cantaro, who I had not found many reviews about. But we went with it and I am glad we did! The rate is as posted on the website - $95 for first 3 hrs and $25/hr after that.

Upon exiting the cruise terminal, Cantaro (and Gerry who was waiting on another group) was exactly where Eduardo had said he would be. He had a sign with our name welcoming us to Cozumel. Upon getting to the van, he asked if we had specific places we wanted to go. After hearing how we wanted to spend the day, he came up with a gameplan and off we went.

First, he took us to do a little shopping that my wife wanted to accomplish. After that, we stopped at a couple of coastal areas around downtown and then headed inland to San Gervasio to see the Mayan Ruins. Along the way, Cantaro shared with us more about the island, answered all our questions, and even stopped at a roadside taco stand he was familiar with and kindly insisted on buying us tacos (we made sure he recouped this in the tip...and by the way the tacos really were awesome!).

After spending 30-45 minutes at San Gervasio, we headed to the east side of the island and stopped along the beach at several spots. Cantaro took us to the highest spot on the island and was a great photographer for us throughout the day, taking several pics of my wife and I together for us. We stopped in Cocunuts, a bar and grill with lots of character. There we ran into Gerry, as well as some couples from our ship.

Our last stop before heading back into downtown was at Playa Palancar, where we enjoyed a very nice lunch and margaritas. After lunch, we had Cantaro take us back to the shopping district where we ended our day on our own and took a cab back to the ship a couple of hours later for $7.

Overall, we felt very comfortable with Cantaro, he designed an itinerary based on our desires that was just perfect for us, and we thoroughly enjoyed our time on the island. I would highly recommend going through Eduardo to get reservations with Gerry or Cantaro if you are seeking a driver for a day in Cozumel. The service was outstanding!!!

I got in touch with Eduardo and he responded in minutes. There is now an online form for reserving with Gerry. I've posted the details on a new thread.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1367738&highlight=

I think the new thread was removed since it wasn't in reply to an inquiry. So here is the info again that I had posted earlier.

Many of us have been frustrated recently trying to make reservations with the highly regarded driver Gerry in Cozumel. I learned from another poster today that Mike is no longer handling his reservations. I reached out this morning to the new contact Eduardo (eduardoczm@gmail.com). Eduardo is handling reservations primarily for Gerry, but also has access to other drivers (as I had feared, I confirmed that Mike had double booked Gerry for the day of my visit in March, but Eduardo has placed me with Cantaro for our trip so we will have a driver). Eduardo has created an online form for making reservations. See information from Eduardo below....

~~~~~~~~~

email From Eduardo:

I do handle reservations not only for Gerry, there is another taxi guide same quality service and price as Gerry, his name is Cantaro...

in this link you can find the online format we made to make the reservations easier and faster, take a look and just fill up your info and I will reply with your confirmation code same day

http://www.toursplaza.com/categorias...iring_a_driver

~~~~~~~~~

Hope this is helpful for everyone in getting back in touch with Gerry.

Yes - thanks for the information. I've been trying to get in touch with Mike for several weeks regarding my reservation on March 11th. Hopefully Eduardo can help.

 

 

Chris

I got in touch with Eduardo and he responded in minutes. There is now an online form for reserving with Gerry. I've posted the details on a new thread.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1367738&highlight=

Laura...thanks so much from this exTex's heart for sharing the new contact information. We hope that Mike's new venture works for him and Eduardo gets Gerri back in the loop.

 

Stephen

Yes - thanks for the information. I've been trying to get in touch with Mike for several weeks regarding my reservation on March 11th. Hopefully Eduardo can help.

Chris